New Zealand Housing · Data Analysis

We didn't run out of houses.
We ran out of fairness.

Three decades of Stats NZ data challenge the dominant political narrative about New Zealand's housing crisis.

Finding One · Supply

Housing stock has outpaced population for as long as we've measured

The standard political account goes like this: New Zealand didn't build enough houses, population grew, and prices rose as a result. The data tells a more complicated story.

Since 1991, the number of dwellings in New Zealand has grown faster than the population in almost every year. The gap between the two lines is the supply "surplus" — houses built above and beyond what population growth alone would require.

But here's the thing about cumulative growth charts: where you start changes everything. Drag the slider below to move the baseline year and watch how the political narrative shifts.

1991
Baseline year — index starts here
1991199620012006201120162019
+58%
Housing stock growth
from baseline
+51%
Population growth
from baseline
+7pp
Housing surplus
over population
Housing stock Population
Source: Stats NZ — Estimated Private Dwellings (DDE Q4); Estimated Resident Population (DPE annual)
Finding Two · The Ratio

More houses, same crowding — the paradox of supply

If we've been out-building population for three decades, you'd expect the average number of people per dwelling to be falling. It hasn't. The ratio has sat in a remarkably tight band — between 2.52 and 2.66 — for the entire period.

This tells us that new houses aren't freeing up capacity in any meaningful way at the national level. Something is absorbing the surplus. The most likely candidates: smaller household sizes (more people living alone, ageing population), holiday homes and baches, and genuine vacancies.

Use the slider below to explore: how many dwellings would need to be made available if we targeted a lower people-per-dwelling ratio — say, 2.4 instead of today's 2.55?

2.55
Target people per dwelling
2.22.32.42.52.62.7
2.547
Actual 2024
people/dwelling
0
Extra dwellings
needed at target
0%
Increase in
stock required
People per dwelling (actual) Your target ratio
Source: Stats NZ DDE / DPE. Ratio = resident population ÷ estimated private dwellings (Dec quarter).
Finding Three · The Human Cost

Housing deprivation rose while supply improved

If supply were the whole story, you'd expect homelessness to track housing stock — falling when building accelerates, rising when it slows. Instead, severe housing deprivation has trended upward across the entire period, largely independent of supply cycles.

Toggle the political events below to see how policy moments intersected with the data.

Housing stock (left) Population (left) Deprivation — old method (right) Deprivation — expanded method (right)
Methodology break: The 2018 estimate added "uninhabitable housing" as a category not counted before 2018. The 2013→2018 jump is partly definitional. Pink series (2001–2013) and red series (2018–2023) use different methods and cannot be directly compared.
Sources: Stats NZ DDE/DPE; Severe housing deprivation: University of Otago (2001/2006); Stats NZ (2013); Stats NZ/HUD (2018/2023, expanded definition). Base: December 1991.

The crisis isn't that we didn't build.
It's that we built for the wrong people.

For three decades, New Zealand has consistently built more homes than population growth required. The people-per-dwelling ratio has barely moved. And yet severe housing deprivation has risen, rents have soared, and homeownership has fallen sharply for younger generations.

This is not a supply crisis in the aggregate sense. It is a crisis of distribution, tenure, affordability, and speculative investment — problems that more consents alone will not fix.

Data: Stats NZ · Teapot Labs